I bet she would love the 35mm f/1.8G DX. It's a great length for the cropped SLRs and its big aperture makes indoor shots without the flash really easy. It's cheap as well (around the £150 mark over here). The other two lenses cover a lot of what she would want, although the 18-55 VR is pretty great (even though it's a kit lens!) and will go much wider than the 28-80.

I have the 18-55 VR II, the 55-200 VR, and the 35mm f/1.8 and the are all awesome.

Frankly, I'm not sure she needs another lens. She has a kit lens and a telephoto, and that's all you need for basic photos and kids being kids.

- She doesn't have much at the wide angle end of things, but she maybe doesn't need it.- More expensive lenses often have better optics, faster focusing, more desirable bokeh, lower apertures, and options for stablization. But they come at a significant price premium.- Fixed lenses offer fantastic value for image quality, wide apertures, and price at the expense of convenience. Enthusiasts are willing to make that tradeoff. Consumers aren't.

My mother is in the same position. She likes taking pictures and has a good camera with a kit lens and an acceptable telephoto. She's artistic. She can afford better gear. But she doesn't care. She takes photos of her grandkids and vacations. No art, no portraits, no wildlife, no landscapes, no macro, no manipulating depth of field, no advanced lighting. I could push her to buy more gear, but what difference would it make?

I have a D50 with both the 55mm f/1.8 (~85mm effective) and 35mm f/1.8 lenses. I had the 55 for a couple years before the 35, and while it was my go-to lens, the 35 is just more versatile indoors. I'd highly recommend the 35mm.

Terra_Nocuus wrote:I have a D50 with both the 55mm f/1.8 (~85mm effective) and 35mm f/1.8 lenses. I had the 55 for a couple years before the 35, and while it was my go-to lens, the 35 is just more versatile indoors. I'd highly recommend the 35mm.

The most important question hasn't been asked: how much do you want to spend?

Pick swimming- usually indoor, low-light mostly action. People spend US$15,000 on camera and lens and are still left wanting. Outdoors, you're not going to do much better on Nikon than a 70-300 outside of upgrading to an 80-400; even used, that's a sizable jump.

If you wanted to get the best of the best for long standard zooms, Nikon's new 18-140G VR takes the cake, optically outperforming Canon's also new 18-135 IS STM.

But as also mentioned above, your 70-300 probably does most of what you need, while the D50 will certainly be lacking in resolution and more importantly in AF tracking ability, high ISO performance, and dynamic range, when compared to a more 'modern' camera like the D90, D7000, or even the just-released D5300.

Airmantharp wrote:The D50 will certainly be lacking in resolution and more importantly in AF tracking ability, high ISO performance, and dynamic range, when compared to a more 'modern' camera like the D90, D7000, or even the just-released D5300.

Airmantharp wrote:But as also mentioned above, your 70-300 probably does most of what you need, while the D50 will certainly be lacking in resolution and more importantly in AF tracking ability, high ISO performance, and dynamic range, when compared to a more 'modern' camera like the D90, D7000, or even the just-released D5300.

Airmantharp wrote:But as also mentioned above, your 70-300 probably does most of what you need, while the D50 will certainly be lacking in resolution and more importantly in AF tracking ability, high ISO performance, and dynamic range, when compared to a more 'modern' camera like the D90, D7000, or even the just-released D5300.

I know that people knock Sony's lens selection, but good lord. At least every Sony body can mate up to every Minolta AF lens and AF will actually work, and work well. I hate the cost-cutting Nikon has done to orphan some very good glass from low to mid-range AF users.